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Carlyle Group Hires Former FCC Chief

Private-equity firm Carlyle Group L.P. named former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski as managing director and partner in its U.S. buyout team.

The hiring marks Mr. Genachowski’s return to the private sector where he previously worked as a venture capitalist.

Mr. Genachowski, who will be based in Washington, D.C., will focus on investments in global technology, media and telecommunications, including Internet and mobile. He joined Carlyle on Monday.

Carlyle’s U.S. buyout team recently completed the final close of Carlyle Partners VI, a $13 billion fund that invests in U.S. corporate buyouts and minority investments across six industries. Two hundred sixty-nine investors from 43 countries committed capital to the fund.

President Barack Obama appointed Mr. Genachowski, a campaign fundraiser and law-school classmate, in 2009. The former venture capitalist served as FCC chairman from June 2009 to this past May, leading the agency as it moved from regulating copper-wire telephone service to overseeing an expansion of broadband and smartphone service.

Under his tenure, the FCC rejected AT&T Inc.’s proposed merger with T-Mobile, after the Justice Department sued to block the deal on antitrust grounds. The companies then dropped the plan.

Since leaving the FCC, Mr. Genachowski has taught a joint class at Harvard’s business and law schools, and he has served as a senior fellow at the Aspen Institute.

Before his FCC appointment, Mr. Genachowski also previously worked as an executive at Internet firm IAC/InterActiveCorp.

Firms like Carlyle make money by buying up companies, often with borrowed funds, then selling them at a profit. The buoyant stock market that has lifted company values recently has both helped and hurt buyout firms, which are reaping profits from past deals in huge volume this year but are finding it difficult to identify new deals where they can expect the 20% or better annualized returns such firms target.